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One good idea deserves another: Book Giveaway

Simon Mainwaring / Creativity / 9 years ago

As my way of saying thank you for all the incredible feedback and support I’ve received in the past year, I’ve decided to launch a book giveaway.

These are all books that I have read or am reading as research and think are worthwhile. (Your book will be new of course!) It’s a great way to keep good ideas flowing among us and a small way to say thanks for sharing your time and thinking.

So here’s how it works. Each week I will profile a book and the next week I will give a copy away to a random person who has commented on a blog post during that week. Then you email or DM a work address to me and I’ll send it to you. Simple, no?

The books will be in the areas of marketing, branding, advertising, social media, philanthropy and non-profit work from authors like Jim Collins, Shel Israel, Chris Brogan, Seth Godin and more. Plus I’ll stay up to date with the latest books and give away the best ones.

The point is not to get more comments or promote the books. The authors don’t even know I’m doing it. I just had the idea because I’m so absent-minded I kept ordering the same books twice from Amazon as part of my research and this seemed like a good way to give back. (Now you know the real me!)

So look out next week for the first book with a short synopsis and thanks for your continued interest and support.

I know. It's so funny. I've even bought three copies of some books. My wife can't believe it. I just get so busy I forget what I've ordered and Amazon doesn't make it clear. It was meant to be though! Time to give them away! Best, Simon

This is a great idea. I'm so glad we haven't lost touch with the art of reading books, despite how much content we consume online. I just finished reading a fascinating book..you might have already read it The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Affects Our Lives (http://tinyurl.com/ycalv8b), and it has actually changed how I think and work. Now that's the power of a great book! My current book is Tim Brown's Change by Design (http://tinyurl.com/mz6p22)– I'm sure you're familiar with it. Maybe we should start an online book club. I created a list for the Creative Council to read and I can add these to it.

Thanks, Heather. I would be more than happy to start an online book club. Let me know how we do it and I'm in. I haven't read Change by Design yet but want to. I'm currently reading Seth Godin's Linchpin. So , yes, let's start sharing what we like and learn from and we'll share it with others. Thanks, Heather.

well I'm exploring google wave at the office and just starting to scratch the surface of its potential. we can share a wave, and invite anyone that wants to join. there are polls so people can vote on what books thye like (and more apps are being built all the time), and it's possible to collaborate remotely with many people in real time. There's something brilliant about reading a book with others, and then discussing those themes …we can combine offline and online. Might be an interesting experiment. Maybe start with local people. I'm game if you are.

Sounds great. the only thing is the limited number of people with Wave and understanding how to use it. A suggestion – maybe we create hashtags on twitter around a book and have a stream of discussion that way. I keep running into people who find wave difficult or don't have it. Just a thought. I'm up for anything. Maybe there is a twitter apps that would work well for a book group. Let's both look. Thanks, Simon

Hi Simon. Pondering this today, I guess I was thinking more of a virtual literary salon…a la Gertrude Stein. Maybe invite only, but it would be global and very diverse. Not too large. However, the Twitter model could work as well. Simply a question of depth vs. breadth as Clay Shirky puts it. Just depends on the flavor of it. I have multiple Wave invites, and am sure I could get more. It’s really quite simple, but it’s like any tool, you need to use it for it to become meaningful. Feel free to email me at heather.white-laird@icrossing.com. Might make it easier to follow this thread. Just reading a review of Linchpin now; sounds fascinating.